Blood Simple
by Mariagoner
Summary: The roots of the Solidor line are so tangled that one can’t possibly escape. Even the best can only hope to avoid the very worst traits. A look at the relationship between Vayne and Larsa, for the Uses of Enchantment series.


Though they'd probably be surprised to know it, this piece wouldn't at all be possible without the marvelously meticulous **Threewalls**, who really pushed me to _think _about Vayne and cycles of abuse, and the excellent **Kilraaj**, who more or less handed me the summary in a previous comment.

In any case, I hope you two enjoy! And comments, corrections and criticism are, as always, completely welcome and loved! This was a _hard_, albeit brief, piece for me to write and I'd love to know if you think I came anywhere near close to nailing the relationship with Larsa and Vayne…

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**Title: Blood Simple**

**Fandom: Final Fantasy XII**

**Series: The Uses of Enchantment**

**Characters: Larsa, Vayne**

**Rating: PG-13**

**Summary: The roots of the Solidor line are so tangled that one can't possibly escape. Even the best can only hope to avoid the very worst traits.**

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"When the time comes for me to die, your hands shall be the pair that will fashion my grave."

At nights such as these, Larsa no longer sits raptly before his brother as once he had before, before all the world had seemed on the edge of burning and blurring before them. Instead, he paces around the throne that Vayne has made for himself like a feral stray from the Golmore jungles, hair perpetually on the edge of disarray and mouth parting momentarily to show fangs whenever Vayne spoke to or of his kin. Right now, of course, he was doing just that and even as Vayne spoke, all the eldest Solidor could see of his brother were the scarlet soles of his boots and the gleam of his eyes as Vayne's eventual death circled him.

"One day," Vayne continues, and his voice is as sweet as he can make it. "One day or one night or one sunset or one sunrise, you may do to me all that you will. Garroting or poisoning, beheading or drowning-- I leave the means up to you as long as you cover well your deeds. You are my heir, my only descendent, and the last boon I will ever grant to you shall consist of such choices, such means."

Somewhere in the darkness of the Bahamut, Vayne thought he heard the sound of a pommel being gripped till the fine metalwork of it groaned. Nowadays, his brother always carried his sword unsheathed at his side, and his sword breaker ever ready.

"You can't tell me that at least a part of you isn't eager," he said, gently, gently, as gently as Larsa would have it, and gloved hands tightened on metal somewhere with a sigh of fine silk whispering. "I'd be a fool to believe that _you_ would believe all that I told you-- you've always been, Larsa, the most exemplary of my students. I wouldn't have believed in the coincidences that led to so many uprisings and you can't truly believe in it either."

And there it is again-- the sound of Larsa's harsh breathing, no longer quite like a child's, almost as heavy as a man's. He is growing, the Solidor's youngest is growing, and Vayne's eyes are carried into the galley ways of the Bahamut, where the walls are painted with emblems. Serpent twined with serpent, as his brother's mind is ever twined with his own-- and though he knew what he was doing was inevitable, some part of Vayne regrets it as he has never before regretted anything.

He had never wanted to break his brother in as he had been broken. He had hoped that in the end, he could have given Larsa something better than what he'd had to face, something kinder than the mares that used to surrounded him in sleep, something far finer and far kinder than anything his brothers had ever given to him--

But Larsa needed to become _strong_. And more than power and more than protection and more than prestige and more than promises, _this_ would be what Larsa would inevitably carry of him. _This_ would end up being Vayne's legacy.

"Not now, of course," Vayne reminds him, though he knows something still approaches, as steadily and as stealthily as desert grains carried by the wind. "But in the years to come, when you are a man grown, you will understand. And after you have done what needs to be done, you'll act properly. You shall go through the streets of Archades in black, with your lady wife in a veil and your own heir trailing in your wake, and all the powerful men of all the world will follow under your sway. And then and only then shall you mourn, and command all others to follow carefully."

And finally his brother speaks and when he does, Vayne realizes that Larsa is also capable of wounding something in him.

Like the sword his brother will turn against him in the years to come, love has a double-edged blade.

"What makes you believe I shall do as you command?" Larsa snarls, almost snarls, is on the verge of a snarl, but not quite, surely not, let Vayne have a few more days of his brother's regard yet. Let him not think his brother a monster completely. "What makes you think-- what makes you so sure-- what makes you believe that that you even _deserve_ to be mourned? That I will be the one to do it? That you have done anything right now besides amass a pile of corpses now? What makes you so sure that…?"

So sure, Vayne thinks. So sure. And he looked and he looked and he looked at the boy staggering before him-- his miniature duplicate, his tiny reflection, this copy of him that was so much better than he could ever be, that held so much more goodness, more promise-- and thought of the last time Larsa had simply and clearly loved him.

He had been twenty-five years old and his brother had merely been ten. It had been someone's birthday and they had celebrated on the coast of the Phon waters, where the swollen mouth of the tributary had swept tri-colored sea shells as though for their liking. He had helped his younger brother collect the most beautiful things there, hand in hand for they wore no gloves, and recited the most outrageous lies about what went on in the pearly chambers of their collection as Larsa had laughed and laughed and laughed until he had almost wept into the waves. And afterwards, Larsa had put his small arms around his brother as best as he could and kissed a forehead lined from a conqueror's worry and told him that he loved him and that they ought to do this the next year, and the year after that, and the year after that.

As long as possible, Larsa had said with a smile. Because I miss you greatly when you are not with me, no matter how strong all the rest of the world needs you to be. And if my lord brother isn't here, who shall teach me of such

[_forged and false but larsa had never questioned him then_

magnificent things?"

They had never had another chance to hunt for sea shells with each other again. And now, all Vayne could do was turn his face upwards and close his eyes and think of all that there was in the world that he had sorted, all that was left to be thoroughly cleansed, and all that he would gladly do over and over and over again, for his brother's sake.

"You will always love me," Vayne finally says, "for I love you better than anyone else still left on this earth ever can."

And Larsa's breathing is heavier than ever and his sword is on the verge of being drawn, sparks of light illuminating his drawn face and wide, wet eyes, shining momentarily like spotlights even in the darkest chambers he was placed.

"You've--" he begins, and his voice is strangled and everything in Vayne that remained untouched by the world and untrammeled by time stilled and silenced and stopped for the moment. "You've made sure of that, haven't you? All of this and so many dead, so many gone and so much wasted, and father killed and Drace murdered and everything I wanted gone and gone and everything and everything and _everything_… And you did this and you are proud to do this and-- for _what_? I don't even _understand_ what could be driving you here!"

"I do it all for you," Vayne said with absolute sincerity, with honest piety, with all the chambers of the heart still left in his being. "Because you are all that I have left in the world and when I leave it, you'll be all that's left of me."

And when Larsa's eyes narrow with defiance, with hate, with anger and with strength, with the sort of steel that would be suicidal in any other boy without a brother who loved him so …

All Vayne could do was think, very quietly and very quickly, with a hope and terror that verged on unseemly:

One day, you really _will_ rid the world of me.

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**Author's Note**: Believe me, this _will_ have annotations. Long, wordy, incredibly psychoanalytic annotations. Oddly enough, I've long been in the mood to study human behavior and lacking actual test subjects, I've started to turn my attention to fictional characters. Brace yourself for hard-core psych geekery soon, everybody. ;)

And... well... y'all know how I keep making little jokes about how Larsa is not all that stable in the head and has problems with being a little _too_ eager for emotional stability and intimacy? Erm... well... there are several reasons for that but god knows that having Vayne as his brother-- _especially_ after Larsa really and truly learns what sort of man his once-role-model was-- didn't help matter either...


End file.
